Humans of Paly

Lauren and Sydney Sung, 2022

It is really fun to have a twin because it is almost like you always have a friend with you, and it is nice to always have someone to talk to. Because we are identical twins, people always get confused which one of us is which. Being referred to as one person is definitely a downside. We think we look completely different, but other people who do not see us regularly do get confused. However, this year we have different teachers so it isn’t a huge issue and even though we have similar friends, most can tell us apart.”

Roland Hu, 2020

Originally when I was in Chemistry Honors, I thought that chemistry was really horrible. But then I got to know my teacher a lot more and I was like ‘dang, this subject is actually pretty cool!’ I have to thank my teacher Ms. Szebert for making chemistry so fun for me. [I studied chemistry after school for fun] because it was really fun, and I wanted to take the AP test.”

Marcus Hong, 2019

I work for Bay Area Kids Triathlon. I am the assistant race director there. Basically what we do is we host three events every year. It’s about half a day’s work. Any kids from two-year-olds to sixteen-year-olds generally race with varying distances of triathlons. Basically, I walk around and talk to parents; I talk to kids and whenever they need help, whenever they’re like ‘oh no I came half an hour late!’ and need help, that’s basically what I do. I walk around and help them. Anytime someone is like ‘you know, we need an extra hand and the check-in station cause half of our people didn’t show up’ – true story actually, it’s really bad – I basically go in and help them. It’s really nice, it’s really fun. Once people finish, we give out awards to top five finishers for all age groups, both boys and girls and it’s really cute to see the little kids go ‘Yay!’ and they jump up and down like really happy.”

Alex Franklin, 2022

I think volleyball is really cool because it’s one of the only sports I really like, and I’m super passionate about playing it in college. I really like watching it too. Seeing other people who are good at it too really motivates me to be better. Seeing how good people can get really motivates me to think that I can be like that one day and become better. I really want to play even more competitively through college.”

Neil Kapoor, 2020

Well, you don’t necessarily know when a judge is unfair. Usually the entire time the judge just stares at you during the debate so you have no idea what they’re thinking. Sometimes, you can make assumptions, and those assumptions can guide you in how you can debate. So, if your judge was a middle-aged Asian woman, maybe there are certain things you can guess based on stereotypes what they like or don’t like. Or if a judge is an older white dude, maybe talking about women’s rights isn’t the most important thing to him. Sometimes you’ll have a judge that will nod along while you’re debating; that’s a clue to keep talking about that and make it the most important issue in the debate.”

Daniel Nguyen, Math Teacher

There are two favorite soups that I waver between. There’s one called Bún bò Huế, and it’s a beef noodle soup with lemongrass and cuts of meat. The noodles are like rice noodles, but they’re thicker than pho noodles. So they’re round but not like udon thick. It’s super good. Super spicy. That’s one type, but I don’t know how to make that type. Another one that’s good is called Bún riêu, and Bún riêu is soupy with vermicelli noodles that are thinner, but the meat of it is crab and egg. It’s super good. It’s super seafood-y, and garlicky. That one I do know how to make.”